


Lost Souls

by leaderhyungs



Category: EXO (Band), Red Velvet (K-pop Band)
Genre: Almost Romance, Americana, Childhood Trauma, College, Drunk Sex, F/M, Hitchhiking, Platonic Relationships, Roadtrip, Romance, Slice of Life, Teenager
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-05
Updated: 2018-07-05
Packaged: 2019-06-05 19:23:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,140
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15177620
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leaderhyungs/pseuds/leaderhyungs
Summary: He was supposed to go to this roadtrip from Vermont to Los Angeles alone.





	Lost Souls

The red Mustang is a stark contrast to the greenery around the gray concrete. The rumbling of the engine further resounds through the trees it is passing through, the tiny cheep-cheeps of the birds drowned-out by the imposing, inconsiderate sound of the old car bumping along on the several potholes the interstate road boasts. The mechanical sound of the engine and the tires and the clanging of the hind car bumper where it hangs lower than the other side is enough to be heard a kilometer away from the interstate road, especially since it is the middle of the night, and the forest surrounding them is very quiet, save from the lone hoots of the owls, the lost cheeps of the birds and the cheerfully depressing hum of the crickets, all of which are hiding in the trees.

Closer, though, and one can hear the sound of emo-pop bleeding through the wide open windows and twin laughters permeating through the open air. Even closer, and one is greeted with the sight of two teenagers – a boy with a cloistered, emotionless look on his face, his dark reddish brown hair whipping around his lean, smooth face, his thin lips pressed into the tiniest of smiles that doesn’t quite reach his sharp, dark eyes. He was maneuvering the wheel, knuckles easy and lenient, one of his forefingers hitting the steering wheel to the beat of the music. His companion, a girl, a few years younger from the look of it, is sitting comfortably on the front passenger seat, her black hair a tangled mess around her while her hair whipped in the wind from the outside of the car, her even darker eyes enigmatic even as her wind-chapped lips parts in a wild rendition of the song that is playing on the stereo. Tonight, they have managed to find a Boys Like Girls record from under one of the upholstery mats, and they have cranked the audio up after she pushed it into the CD player after finding it, a suggestive grin on her face. She said it sounded so much like the freer times, when she was still a kid. He doesn’t know her, but he is sure it is true.

 

***

 

She said her name was Xuiying, and instantly, he knew that it was a lie. He met her while he was driving on the I-40 at Syracuse. He just turned 21, and as a birthday gift, his father gave him the Mustang and a thousand dollars, with a clap on his shoulder.  _“Why don’t you take her out for a drive? When I was your age, I took this baby for a ride to Florida. See if you can go farther, son.”_ He didn’t have to think twice. Home was toxic nowadays and this drive to wherever he wanted was liberation. Two days later, he stocked the Mustang up with food to last him three days for a trip to Albuquerque and back, hugged his silent mother and his lightly smiling father goodbye before boarding the car and driving off.

 _She_ was standing by one of the bends in the road when he was just leaving Syracuse, a few hours into his travel. She was wearing a sort of impractical outfit for her surroundings: a frilly white sundress, lace dotting the neckline, a backpack slung over her pale shoulders as she raised a hand for him to stop.

“Say, I have to go to Los Angeles,” she said, red glossed lips parted into a friendly smile as she ducked slightly to peer into his face through the open window, “do you think you can let me hitchhike?”

He was about to say no. He was supposed to say no. This trip was supposed to be about him. Him, him, him, no one else. This was about him experiencing the world (well, at least the whole country) before he goes off to college in the fall.

But there was something about the playful smile, the twinkle in her dark, dark eyes. “Okay,” he said, unlocking the front passenger door.

She gives out a tiny cheer that Sehun didn’t particularly find appealing before she slung her bag over her shoulder and opened the door, sliding into the front seat, the hem of her sundress riding up on her thighs while she tried to get settled down. Sehun’s gaze flitted briefly on the expanse of peaches and cream complexion of her thigh. It wasn’t thin, nor perfectly shapely, somehow it was a bit chubby. Ah, the things he notices.

“I’m Xuiying,” she said, without skipping a beat, red lips parted in a wide grin. “Thanks.”

 

***

 

He introduced himself as Shixun. He figured that if she’s going to lie about her name, then he would, too. It wasn’t wholly a lie—Shixun  _is_  his Chinese name. One of his aunts went to China for half a decade and went back to Korea, and she called him nothing but  _Shixun, Shixun, Shixun_  and he never got used to it. To be truthful, it sounded an awful lot cooler than plain “Sehun.”

“Shixun? That sounds cool,” was the only response that he got for that lie. Somehow, Sehun thought that she saw through the lie, too.

After all, only liars get to see through a lie.

 

***

 

She has recently gotten into college, she said, while sipping on a bottle of tomato juice which she cringed a bit from, her delicate features scrunching into a grimace before laughing loudly at what she has done. “And I make a lot of funny faces when I’m on a sugar rush.”

Sehun has gone from being just tolerant to just plain amused by her. She wasn’t that hard to like—she was a very open, very talkative, yes, and there would have once been a time that he would have flipped out at that kind of attitude, but right now, with only a limited songs he could play on a week-long road trip he was planning from his iPod, she was fast becoming his source of entertainment. That, and even though from her pretty little mouth she spouted the most random, somehow personal, somehow dubious stories, she never required him to talk about himself. It wasn’t that she was self-centered, he thought during one of the times that she was asleep while he was driving, but it was so much as if she knew that he didn’t like anyone prying in his private life.

“Cool,” he said. It was fast becoming his go-to phrase whenever she spoke. She made a funny face at him, and he realized that he could have pertained to her funny-face-making. He cracked an embarrassed laugh. “I mean—the fact that you’re the age to go to college. Damn,” he laughed, taking one hand off the wheel to scratch at the back of his head, “but the face-making is rather cool too. Yeah. I mean… yeah.”

He didn’t make sense he knew it and he knew that he was flustered. She must be judging him now.

But she laughed. It was a bright laugh, girlish, nothing special, but it was nice to hear. “I appreciate that you like my face-making,” she commented teasingly, “and yeah, I got into college.”

“Well,” he shrugged, smiling. He rarely smiled—there wasn’t much reason to, anyway, and he most definitely didn’t smile with people he only met a few hours ago (okay, maybe it was a little over a day, but that was the cool thing about roadtrips—they seem to last an eternity). It was not hard to feel at ease with Xiuying. “Which college will you be going?”

“It’s quite close to my hometown, considering it’s college and people move away for college,” she said in a flippant voice. Sehun peeked at her from the corner of his eye and saw that she was playing with the ends of her hair. As he turned his attention to the road, narrowly missing a pothole in the national road, she said, “but I’m considering not coming there. I’ve passed in another school a few states away… I just don’t want to live at home for college.”

“I can see what you mean,” he said. Because he did. Seeing the plain sadness in his father’s countenance and the veil of depression itself clouding the atmosphere at home is not something he wants to stay in, especially if he had the option of running away. “Parents?”

“You have no idea.”

“Try me.”

The challenge in his languid tone made her giggle.

The sound of her giggling was very nice.

 

***

 

They were in Ohio when Xuiying asked if they could stop to grab a drink. It had been a few hours since their last stop over at a gasoline store, so Sehun conceded.

The honky-tonk town of Arleigh, OH was somehow like a ghost town, Sehun could count the occupied houses in his mind and he was sure they will not number to over fifty.

“We can stay there—I can use some milkshakes right now,” Xiuying said, pointing to one of the buildings along the road. Sehun tore his eyes from where he was surveying the quaint, country homes with the fences that needed a little maintenance and the clothing lines from where shirts and bed sheets, among others, hung. It seems so much like the quintessential classic American countryside image, except it was juxtaposed with pieces from modernity, like the gasoline station they passed a while ago… and even through that, it still looked so vintage, like Sehun has gone back in time to where living was simple in America.

There was an inn with a diner at the general direction that Xiuying pointed, so he stopped there. “I have a limited budget,” he said as he pulled the key out of the ignition, flashing her a serious look. “I only have a couple thousand bucks in my pocket, so yeah.”

Xiuying raised an eyebrow at him. “I have my own money, dude, it’s all okay. We can split the room cost, it shouldn’t be too expensive. If it is, let’s just sleep in the car. That’s what we have done for the past days, right?”

Days? How many days? He actually didn’t know now. He should be back to Vermont in a week, but he’s not aware of how the days passed. “You’re the one who slept. I was the one who drove,” he chided as he closed the door behind him, locking it. There wasn’t a high chance someone’s going to steal the car, but he was born and raised in a city, and old habits die hard. “Don’t overgeneralize.”

“You know that’s not true, it’s been days, and I’ve seen you sleep when we were parked at Pennsylvania hours ago,” she said, sticking her tongue out at him as she walked towards the entrance of the diner. It was a vintage-type diner, with saloon doors and everything, and red plastic booths and metal-plate tables. It was very cute, very Instagram-worthy, Mijoo from home would say with her bubbly smile. Sehun pushed her out of his thoughts. Mijoo was an unwelcome thought. “Don’t overestimate yourself, Shixun.”

 _Shixun_. Nights of the name whispered in his ear. It still makes him shiver, that name. “Fine, whatever. You ask how much the overnight stay is.”

She flashed him a look that said,  _Pushy bastard_ , and she walked towards the counter, striking up a conversation with the barkeep. Or whatever the people of Arleigh called the lone guy manning the counter.

Sehun sank onto the first vacant booth he saw, and he looked out the huge sprawling windows that boasted nothing but almost-deserted wilderness. Arleigh was depressing.

“I got you a chocolate milkshake—and if you don’t like chocolate, you’re a loser and you deserve to be cultured,” she said in a teasing voice, coming up to the table with a couple of milkshake glasses, one brown topped with a cloud of whipped cream, the other pink. She slid across from him at the table.

“Cheeky.” He commented dryly even as his mouth watered at the sight of chocolate. Chocolate was his favorite flavor. He took a sip, and damn, Arleigh might be honky-tonk but this chocolate milkshake was the bomb. Not that he was going to tell Xiuying that, he’s had let her win far too many times this morning already. He tried to keep his countenance placid, and he could see her roll her eyes.

“Boarding’s fifteen dollars a night,” she offered sulkily, pretty lips wrapping at the black straw.

He smiled inwardly. Her pout was cute. “Alright, let’s just stay here for tonight. My back’s stiff from all the sitting we’ve done.”

“What if we go around? What’s the point of having a roadtrip if you’re just going to drive and drive?” she asked, an eyebrow rising. She flipped her long hair over her shoulder and he could see a flash of white collarbone. “Maybe you can see something here worth taking back.”

“Like what? Have you seen the surroundings? I can bet there isn’t a souvenir shop around,” he said, swirling the whipped cream around in his glass.

“I never said you had to spend anything. Gosh, are you a prepschool kid? You should live a little.” Shaking her head, she, took the straw from her drink and pointed it to his direction. “We’re going exploring before it gets dark, and yes, that’s whether you like it or not.”

He protested. He would kick and flail his legs and arms if he could without the other people in the diner looking at him like he was crazy. But whatever he did, that glint in her eye told her that she has won.

He doesn’t know her, really, and she’s got him whipped like a broken-in horse.

 

***

 

 _Shixun_.

_You’re a very, very good boy. Smile for auntie, see?_

_This feels very good, right, Shixun?_

_You must make auntie feel good, too._

_Shixun, you make me so proud._

_You’re disgusting…_

_How could you live with yourself?_

“Shixun.”

 

***

 

They didn’t talk about that night in Ohio, and Sehun was thankful that Xiuying didn’t ask. He didn’t want to talk about the nightmares, because talking about the nightmares always gives him more nightmares, and it will be a cycle, and it would be just like before.

He didn’t want to see the disgusted face Xiuying would make if he told her, if she knew. There’s a tiny part of him that didn’t want to be judged again.

They stopped over to fill the gas tank at the border of Ohio and Kentucky. As the tank filled, Xuiying slipped out of the front passenger seat, trilling that she’s going to buy candies at the grocery store. It wasn’t even five minutes that she came rushing back with a shit ton of candies inside a paper bag, which she unloaded all over the back seat.

“What the actual—my backseat is going to smell all sugary with all that. Are you sure you’re not angling for diabetes?” He asked in incredulity as the mass of chocolate and gummies and, well, candy flowed out from the paper bag.

Xuiying continued shaking the paper bag upside down, and when she was finally convinced that no sweet treat was stuck inside, she flashed him the cheekiest smile that made him backtrack a little because it was too brilliant. “If sugar is the solution for you to stop frowning like a grumpy old troll, then fine. I happen to hate talking by myself, you know.” Ducking into the backseat, she grabbed a Milky Way and shoved the piece into Sehun’s mouth, her forefinger pressing against his upper lip as she made sure that the chocolate stayed there.

He’s never seen a girl quite like her before, and it showed on his face. Xuiying laughed as she settled into her seat, leaning out to close her door and pull her legs up against her chest. “See? Not so bad, isn’t it?”

The Milky Way melted on his tongue and he forced down a laugh at how self-satisfied she looked.

“Drive on, Shixun! L.A. awaits!”

And he was thrown.  _Shixun_. The name doesn’t nearly sound as bad when she says it.

 

***

 

They decided to not pass Tennessee and go straight to Oklahoma. They stopped at an inn in a city in Missouri (Sehun didn’t remember what it was called, and Xiuying rarely was right about directions, anyway) for a night, sharing a room because room costs in a city is relatively more expensive than in the countrysides. Besides, they have spent a little too much on food and road tolls, and Sehun still has to go back to Vermont. Maybe his dad will be able to wire him money, but that goes the entire point of an independent roadtrip.

He couldn’t even bring himself to regret agreeing to drive Xuiying to L.A. with him. Without Xuiying, the trip would be awfully boring. She knew he kind of valued her presence with him in that car, but then again, he wouldn’t openly admit a weakness like that. That has been his entire life in a nutshell, anyway: denial of weaknesses.

“I’ll pay for the next inn, I promise,” Xuiying said the moment she entered the room they will be sharing, the initial embarrassment at being thought of as lovers at the front desk apparently gone. It wasn’t hard to mistake them as lovers, so Sehun understood, but even if he is twenty one years old and had his fair share of flings, one-night stands and girlfriends ( _Mijoo, Mijoo, Mijoo_ ), being mistaken to be boyfriend-girlfriend with a girl he barely knew and knew so well made him a little shy and conscious around Xuiying, a thing that she noticed and made fun of, in that refreshing, little-girlish way of hers. Sehun closed the door behind him and dropped his small rucksack on the floor—a rucksack that contained not only his but her clothes, too, and their money (“I’m shit at keeping money, so yeah,” Xuiying has told him before)—and flopped down on the bed beside her, his elbow poking at her side, making her yelp and roll over on her side.

“That hurts,” she whined as she rolled again on the bed so she can lie face down on the pillows. Okay, so maybe splurging money on this hotel room was worth it.

“The bed isn’t only yours, it’s mine, too,” Sehun said as he stretched, eyes closing tight as he arched his back, joints popping at the effort and offering sweet relief. “After all, I did pay for most of the room.”

“Well, I won’t sleep on the carpet,” Xuiying said petulantly. “And yes, I win. You always let me win.”

There would be a time that Sehun would question why he’s always letting Xuiying win, but Xuiying was a hurricane in her own, and Sehun was never one to take the road less taken.

 

***

 

They are halfway through their trip from Vermont to Los Angeles, and they have been three days on the road. Sehun had projected for the trip to last a week, and he’s torn from actually considering it as a treat or a drawback that he met Xuiying. Having Xuiying onboard surely guaranteed that he wasn’t bored, or wasn’t dwelling in the past and the angst and everything else in between while driving, but it also defeated the purpose of him being alone and self-reflecting in this self-imposed exile to freedom from his suffocating oldtime childhood city he desperately wants to run away from but can’t.

She doesn’t make him feel better, but she sure does give him other things to think about. Her chatter gives him reason to actually try to  _listen_ , and her silences gives him room to appreciate the nature that they’re driving through.

She wasn’t much, but she was able to distract him from the horror and disappointment and sadness he’s been shouldering for years now, and for that, Sehun is thankful.

 

***

 

“How strong are you against alcohol?” Xuiying asks, out of the blue, as they were having their clothes laundered. Her voice was flippant and gentle above the steadily noisy hum of the washing machines they stuffed their dirty clothes in. Sehun, taken aback, looked up from the lone catalog he found sitting on one of the benches inside the tiny laundry shop. With furrowed eyebrows, he turned his gaze upon her.

“What?” Xuiying asked as she raised both eyebrows. “Is that a forbidden question or something?”

“No, it’s just… I got a little taken aback.” Sehun shrugged. “But seriously, what do you know about alcohol?” She looked not even legal.

Xuiying laughed, tinny and mocking. “Seriously, I don’t know if I should get offended or flattered by what you said. I’m freaking nineteen years old, and I am in America, born and raised in New York City where people don’t care if you’re legal or not to drink unless you’re in the wrong neighborhood. Oh wait, that’s America in general. Are you sure you’re living here?”

Sehun looked away after rolling his eyes. It was indeed a dumb question.

“You haven’t answered my question yet,” Xuiying said after a few seconds of the whirring of the laundry machine. She leant over to poke Sehun, her oversized shirt catching a little water stuck on top of the machine. “Don’t make me talk to myself, Shixun.”

“That’s probably what you do half the time on the road,” Sehun said, attempting sass to save face. He ran his fingers back through his hair.

“You reply more than half the time, so no, that’s not what I’m doing. Answer already!” she said, her voice turning to a little bit of whining. Sehun found that he liked when she whined.

“I’d say I’m good enough,” he said, after much satisfaction at hearing her whine and seeing her pout. She was cute, like this, when she was kind of frustrated. “Not that strong and not that weak.”

“Cool,” Xiuying said, and she pooched her lips out in a pout while turning her head towards the direction of the windows, her eyes on him. “What do you say we get a drink?”

 

***

 

They had to stay a night at a small motel that night because Sehun, despite how many times he told Xiuying that he was fairly tolerant, got a little too tipsy to drive. With laughter in her alcohol-stained pink lips, Xiuying had to help him up to the room she paid for for the night (which he still wondered why someone like Xiuying had that much money with her), letting him take the bed in the room while sitting at the edge, still laughing, like it all amused her to no end.

“Stop laughing,” Sehun said, no, moaned in pleading. He threw one of his arms across his eyes, attempting to sleep because goddamn, everything was spinning and even the fair-skinned spectre of her laughing just sitting beside him was wavy and dissolving. “I want to sleep.”

Xiuying laughed as she flopped down on the other end of the bed, a respectable distance away from him. He could hear the tiny slap of her palms against her lips when she covered her mouth to prevent the giggles from coming out. “Good night, Shixun.”

 

***

 

He woke up a little before midnight that night, still in the position of which he slept. It was dark inside the room when he opened his eyes and removed his arm from where it lay across his face. Holding in his breath as he let his eyes adjust to the darkness, he heard soft breathing from beside him.

He turned to his side and Xiuying was sleeping there, on her back with a pillow clutched against her chest. Sehun felt slightly uncomfortable seeing Xiuying’s lying position—it didn’t look very cozy, and he wondered how prim and proper Xiuying’s upbringing have been to render her like this… or if her upbringing really had anything to do with this quirk of hers (he has yet to consider anything Xiuying has done to not be a quirk). He has enough alcohol still in his system to consider shaking her awake and demanding answers.

It was funny, how much he wanted to know. Xiuying was a pain in the ass.

A pretty pain in the ass, he thought lightly as he watched her sleep, all in curiosity. She looked a little different while she was sleeping and the permanent glee in her features was softened. She looked more like a kid than a runaway sass queen who always knew what to say.

Her skin, where the little moonlight spots managed to touch, was even more dewy, even  more soft. The buried desire from their first meeting to touch her skin finally began itching again, after just a few days.

It was unsettling, he had to remove himself from the room.

It was so unnerving that he had wanted to kiss her.

 

***

 

Sure enough, Xiuying was mocking him the very moment she woke up the next day. (Sehun had slept on the couch after he deemed he was not too crazy to kiss her. He wasn’t confident in his drunk self not to be tempted again.) She was pretty like a lily in the late morning sunlight, her hair a messy cloud around her laughing face as she stared at him. It was only when he suggested that they go out for lunch and ice cream after checking out that she shut up about him being a little more lightweight than he advertised himself to be.

It wasn’t just lunch, there was ice cream, too, and Sehun’s mood lifted once he took a spoonful of the smooth chocolate. “We should probably get back on the road,” he said after swallowing, lifting his eyes in seriousness to Xiuying.

She was halfway into taking a spoonful of ice cream into her pink, voluptuous mouth. What timing. Sehun had to look away because his face was already burning red.

 

***

 

“So why did you decide to go on to this roadtrip?” she asked once they had boarded the car and filled it up with gas. She was wearing a large shirt she was able to call up from deep into the recesses of her duffel bag, partnered with some droll sweatpants and somehow she didn’t look as attractive as she did when she was wearing that all-white ensemble, but she still looked very interesting to Sehun.

Sehun shrugged. He didn’t know how to answer that question. “I don’t know,” he said, for that was the most plausible thing to answer.

“You don’t?” Xiuying said, in a very casual tone that somehow seemed to imply that she knew that he was lying. He was always lying to her, and she knew that, because she was always lying to him, too. “Or you just don’t want to tell me?”

“Why do you care anyway?” he asked, suddenly annoyed. She doesn’t have the right to ask him that. No one has, especially someone he just met less than a week ago. He doesn’t have to answer to anyone. No one has to know.

“Nothing much,” she said, face still devoid of emotion that might reflect that she was annoyed or taken aback by his response to his statement. And he didn’t care if she was. Who was she anyway, but a random stranger in his life? “Just that I want to know something about you.”

There was silence after that.

 

***

 

What did she know about him, after all, he thought while continuing on the drive that night, going through side streets because the traffic over at the Interstate was more than horrible. Probably nothing, except that he was snarky and snappy and cranky in the mornings. Maybe, if she was a good observer, she’d have noticed that he prefers chocolate or that he doesn’t sleep without his shirt on, but those were minute details—he wasn’t sure if she caught those.

But what did he know about Xiuying?

Well, he knew she grew up in an upper-middle class neighborhood, that she was oftentimes bullied for her build, that some “bitches” from her grade think that they’re greater than her just because they’re skinnier. He knows that she once poured chocolate milk down the gutter because one of her classmates in third grade told her that it was frog piss. He knows that she loved History a whole lot because it just seemed like a novel or something, and she hates math with a passion because she never really liked solving problems. He knew that she hated pop music because they were “too predictable,” and that she doesn’t like having the light on when she slept. He remembered flicking the in-car light off an hour ago when she had begun to doze off.

He turned his gaze towards her. She was pretty, even in the dark, and somehow he could see her eyelids flutter in the moonlight. She must be dreaming—about the same white sky and blank space again, like what she told him, days before. She would be angling for a blanket in a few moments, and Sehun briefly paused by the pavement to reach out for his jacket from the backseat to pull it over her shoulders. She would burrow into the borrowed warmth and give off a satisfied purr and she’ll sleep again. That was how she was.

He knew lots about Xiuying. She wasn’t really asking for much.

Maybe it was time Sehun gave something back.

 

***

 

“I like omelette… but I hate it when people put onions into it. Onions taste gross.” He said. The sunlight was just peeking out of the mountains in the distance, gently filtering through the tinted windows. She has just woken up from her stupor, her eyes blinking fast, as though trying to get used to the early morning light.

She turned to him, as though surprised. The furrow in between her eyebrows was enough proof of that. Sehun couldn’t explain the warmth in his chest.

“I mean, who even likes to eat onions? They taste nasty,” he said, and he realized he’s rambling, but whoever knew rambling felt this good? Especially if one was waiting for a rise out of the other person in the conversation? “What about you? Do you like onions? My image and conception of you will change drastically if you like onions.”

Xiuying’s visage brightened. She didn’t smile, though, but the twinkle in her sleep-heavy eyes was unmistakable. It made him smile a little. Just a little, because she should not know that he was happy about this.

“You’re uncultured if you dislike onions,” was the only thing she said about the subject, but Sehun will never forget the brightness in her eyes when he finally, finally, opened up.

 

***

 

Oklahoma wasn’t as rustic as was portrayed in every cross-country inspired novel they have read. Either that, or Sehun’s definition of rustic was influenced by the many states he has driven by in the past days. He actually liked the rawness of the Oklahoma scenery as they drove by, listening to country songs Xiuying has actually saved in her iPod. (“You go all alt-rock on me and then you give me country music in your freaking iPod.” “What, I can’t like other genres now?”) The breakfast they had was typical—greasy bacon and eggs and too-sweet pancakes—but it tasted a lot better.

Maybe it was the way they were a little happier than usual. Maybe because they were a bit more open with each other now. Maybe it was because they were… well. A bit more friends than they were a few days ago.

It felt good. It felt really, really good, and with Xiuying scolding him over finishing the pancakes and not just scarfing bacon like it was air, Sehun realized, maybe, just maybe, opening up wasn’t so much a sin.

 

***

 

They have crossed over to Texas when Sehun waxed long and poetic about the drinking games he and his friends have gotten into over the years. He remembered them a lot clearer when Xiuying made inputs about the drinking escapades she had also gone through. It was when he realized that maybe Xiuying really wasn’t the pure little poppet he had seen that fateful day in Syracuse.

“I was fifteen when I lost it,” she said, flippantly as can be, as though it wasn’t a huge deal. “It just felt right at that time, but it was gross.”

“That’s like saying that the whole of mankind is gross,” Sehun commented, nose wrinkling.

“That’s not what I was saying. Just that first time is gross. The next few things were better,” she shrugged. “Hey, pull up. Take some sort of rest, you’ve been driving nonstop since we entered Oklahoma.”

Sehun shrugged back. He really was tired. He pulled over at a bow in the road and killed the engine before pushing the backrest of his seat back, stretching his long arms over his head. “How many times have you done it?” he asked, conversationally. He had to keep the conversation going, he didn’t want it to turn around and make him the center of this conversation.

“Well… I don’t really keep track,” Xiuying said lightly, pulling her legs over against her chest, resting her ankles against the dashboard. “But I haven’t probably done more than twenty. It’s not really… how do you say this… worthy of my time?”

Sehun hummed under his breath. Sex was push and pull and some minutes of pleasure and grunting into the other’s ear and filthy dirty talk. He could see where she was coming from. “Nerd,” he teased.

“Fuck you,” she said, hitting him on the upper arm. “Sex is good. It’s just… I just don’t think it’s for me. Or whatever.”

“So you mean to tell me that you’re frigid? How old are you again?” Sehun said, laughing. It was funny to hear that from a girl younger than he was. “Xiuying, seriously, I don’t know what to make of you.”

“I am not freaking frigid! I never said anything to that effect, you motherfucker,” Xiuying said, hitting him on the shoulder again. “Malicious, you are. And I don’t know if I should take what you just said a compliment or what.”

“It’s a compliment,” Sehun muttered through a yawn. “Old lady.”

“Hey!”

 

***

 

“I lost mine when I was nine.”

She was silent. Maybe she knew where this was going. Maybe she didn’t and was just waiting for the appropriate moment to say anything.

“That freaking rhymed,” he said, in a humorless voice and chuckle. He ran his fingers through his hair once. Twice. Thrice. And another time more. How was he supposed to say this? Was he even supposed to say this? “But it’s true. My aunt kept telling me I was a good boy, and good boys never tell other people. Especially if it was a family member. I was too young to know.

“Then just last year, I had a girlfriend. We… did things. You know. Sex.” He didn’t have to explain, but he wanted to. He had to keep talking. He had to block out the endless  _Shixun Shixun Shixun you’re a good boy a good good boy_ and  _How can you fucking live with yourself, that’s so disgusting I don’t want to date you anymore_  that has been haunting him for more than a decade of his life. “And I loved her so much, and I trusted her too much and I told her. Because wasn’t that what other people did? They told each other things about themselves.”

The twitting of the birds outside was melodious and sweet, and Sehun wanted to throw up, wanted to feel good about himself, because remembering all these… made him feel a lot worthless.

“She broke up with me because I was disgusting. I never did see her again. She moved out of town for college,” Sehun said finally in a light voice, a tone so light it could break.

The sun was lowering itself, the darkness slowly taking over the skies in beautiful hues of violet and dark blue. It was beautiful—the dethroning of the sun.

He expected many things—silence, disdain, more silence—but he never expected the light tap of her palm against his knee. And when he raised his gaze up into her face, she had a light smile on her lips. “Let’s go get a drink?”

 

***

 

One shot led to another, and another, and another. Soon enough Sehun found himself getting a lot drunk, the dim lighting of the pub inviting enough for him to walk into the dancefloor and dance. He didn’t dance as much as he did before. The liquor burned into his veins, and he was fucking drunk and happy, and as much as he has gotten drunk to the pleasure of alcohol, he knew he was more drunk at the brightness of Xiuying’s eyes, of the redness of her lips, of the softness of her skin, of the distinguishable  _Xiuying_  scent of her neck, of the warmth of her forearms as they pressed against the sides of his neck.

“It’s okay to kiss me,” she whispered, lips curving around the syllables.

And kiss her, he did.

 

***

 

It was dark, moonlit, in the car, and he was very dizzy, but the alcohol was thrumming in his veins, his heartbeat picking up at an unknown beat of a song. Xiuying reached across him to turn the radio on, enveloping the closed car with a smooth cadence of a jazz song. He turned his head towards her, and recognized the sweaty, alcohol smell on her hair and skin that wasn’t unlike his when her cheek hit his nose in the small space. He pulled away a bit, just enough that she could look up at him, forehead scrunched in playful admonition, full, chapped lips quirked in a tiny smile as her fingers pressed upon the spot on her cheek that hit his nose. There were a thousand thoughts he could read in her eyes, and when her eyelids closed, dark eyelashes shuttering her pretty, worldly eyes, Sehun raised a hand, working it around the head rest of his seat so his palm could cup her nape comfortably, and pressed his mouth on hers.

At first there was nothing but the softness and the gentle pricking of chapped bits of skin on her lips against his, then she released a soft sigh, petal lips parting as she kissed him, shoulders dropping in a kind of sweet surrender, making Sehun groan as he raised his other hand to cup her cheek. He could feel the smile on her mouth more than he could see it, his tongue running slowly across her lower lip before tasting at the back and tops of her teeth and along the length of her tongue.

There was leftover alcohol in her mouth, burning his tongue slightly as he pushed her against the backrest of the backseats, his legs scrambling to leave the front seat even as their mouths stay connected in a wildly exploring kiss. His heart rate was picking up too fast—too fast, too fast, it  _hurts_ —and he is about to pull away, maybe take a deep breath while looking at her as she lay on the backseat underneath him, her black hair maybe fanned out prettily under her head, but she tugged on his lower lip none too gently with her teeth before he could pull away very far, the only he thing he could see clearly being her eyes. They were even darker this time, but unlike the other times, it wasn’t because she was holding secrets in. This time, Sehun thought as he took a steadying breath as her hands reached up to clasp behind his nape, this time, they both had something to give.

 

***

 

They didn’t always get along on the drive to Los Angeles. Sometimes, if they’re not fucking or kissing or singing along to the songs on the radio, they were ignoring each other, Sehun’s eyes trained out the windshield and Xuiying, sitting with her legs pulled up against her chest while she looked out her window, her hair not wildly flapping in the breeze anymore, but tied down with a rubber band from one of the many bags of bread they bought from the several gasoline stations they stopped by along the way.

When they were mad, they don’t speak. They were alike at that.

But Sehun has gotten used to her chatter, to their comfortable silence, and sometimes, when there was a meadow along the road they were driving through, he’d stop, pick her some daisies if there was some, and hand it to her. A silent peace offering.

And she would tuck the blossoms into her long hair, and she’d stay silent, as he would. But the tension was broken, and affectionate as she was in the best of times, she’d lean over—half an hour, an hour, or maybe two, it doesn’t matter—and kiss him on the cheek. Just a gentle press.

And he’ll know that they’re alright again.

 

***

 

Sehun remembered the first time they met and how she looked like then, her pale skin brilliant in the steady sunlight. She was pretty, back then, but she is prettier right now, on top of him, riding him, her pale skin tinged with pale red and her long black hair plastered to her skin with sweat. She looked better like this, wild and satisfied and in control. She didn’t fit the good Catholic school girl image her folks in New York were so convinced is her true identity. She knew what she wanted, he cursed aloud when she gyrated her hips  _this particular way_  that made her walls tighten deliciously around him.

“ _Shixun_ ,” she gasped as she leant closer, her hands curling into his chest, ragged, bitten-off nails scratching his skin. “ _Shixun._ ”

It was to this litany that he’d hold onto her waist and thrust up. One, two, and three, and maybe more, more, and more, until he’s coming inside her; the disgusting litany of  _Shixun Shixun Shixun_ in a middle-aged woman’s voice, decades old in the back of his head, replaced by the desperately sweet chorus escaping Xiuying’s lips.

Xiuying might never know, Sehun thought as he held her trembling, post-orgasm body close to his chest as they curl into each other in his narrow backseat. Xiuying might never know this, but she saved a part of his soul from crumbling into dust.

 

***

 

Sometimes his clothes and car smell too much like sex and her hair sometimes get too tangled and wild, but Sehun catches a glimpse of Xiuying’s smile and he thinks,  _fuck it, I’m staying_.

She isn’t going to stay for far longer anyway.

California is just a few more miles away.

 

***

 

Their last night on the road was marked in Blythe.

Somewhat they were afraid to touch each other, maybe afraid of tattooing more memories of this roadtrip to Los Angeles into their malleable, impressionable young minds. On the single bed they shared on that last night, they lay, a respectable distance from each other, smothered in silence. Sehun won’t admit it, but maybe, if Xiuying left him now, he’d feel lost.

Or maybe he’d feel liberated, free.

“I’ll probably go to sleep now,” Xiuying said, pulling the blanket over her chest as she turned towards the wall. She was silent, breathing evenly. She was asleep.

Sehun reluctantly sank into his side of the bed after a few more moments, more despondent and nostalgic, and he was about to nod off, too, facing the wall beyond his side of the bed.

He was stirred awake at three-thirty by slender arms snaking around his torso, a warm body pressing against his back, and a soft, “I’ll miss you,” whispered into the air.

 

“I’ll miss you, too,” he said an hour later, when the first lights decorated the dark tint of the sky with splashes of lighter blue. He didn’t sleep. He couldn’t.

Her arm tightened a little around his chest. Turns out she couldn’t, too.

 

***

 

Los Angeles, finally. After a week of travelling cross-country, they have arrived.

Xiuying had asked to be unloaded at Metro Rapid, said she’ll find her way from there. Sehun understood. One week was wonderful, and it was good as long as it lasted, but it was now Los Angeles, the end point, and it had to end there.

The drive to Metro Rapid station was swift, mainly because they used the side roads and not the main ones, avoiding pretty much most of the traffic. It was silent, only the engine roaring between them the dominant sound, but it wasn’t as tense as it was last night in that motel room they checked in to spend their last night. Somehow it was comfortable, right now.

It was all good, at least. They know that they’d miss each other after this. It was, is, good.

“Here you go,” Sehun said lightly, parking by the stop, and he reached from the backseat to help her with her bags as she pushed the car door open. Casually as can be.

“Thanks a lot,” she said as she took the bags. She wore the same white summer dress she wore the first time they met, and she looked beautiful. She always did, Sehun thought, it was a matter of perception, a matter of getting to know her. Her smile was tiny, but it was bright. “Really. It was cool to spend so much time with you.”

Sehun shrugged, cracking a smile of his own. When once it was of politeness, now it was just of fondness. “Glad to have been able to help out.”

“You’re on your way back to where you came from, now, right?” she asked conversationally, slinging her purse over one shoulder. She closed the car door with a small slam and leant down slightly to be able to look into Sehun’s face. Her gaze was light, but he can’t help but feel as though she was memorizing his face. He didn’t mind. He was doing the same—burning her features into his brain, committing her to memory.

 _The girl who saved him, somehow_.

“Uh-huh,” he said. “Gotta check up on Dad and fix things for college.”

“That’s good,” she nodded, her hair bobbing as her head did. “Take the Interstates. It’s faster.”

“I know,” he laughed. “We’ve been there, together.”

Xiuying laughed, and it was a bell tinkling in the air. “I know. And when you drive off, drive off all the way. I know I’m pretty, but I’ll laugh at you a lot if you turned the car back just to profess your undying love to me.”

He brought a full-throated laugh from his throat. Effortless. “I won’t do that. If ever, you’re the one who fell in love with me.”

“As  _fucking_  if!” She laughed. And he did, too.

Their laughter ceased before long, and they both cast their last, long, fond gazes at each other: putting each other’s faces and memories into the scrapbook of their minds: of a week of self-discovery, friendship, truth and liberation. “Take care,” she said, the one to pull away first.

“You, too,” he said. “Goodbye, Xiuying.”

Goodbye, because it was highly unlikely they’ll meet again, because no matter how open, they didn’t dwell on the superficial stuff like addresses and last names and Facebook accounts or phone numbers. Maybe it was better, too, if it was a goodbye. To cut ties right now, where everything was bittersweet and beautiful, before time sullied it for the worse.

He turned the engine on, and was about to drive off, to say goodbye to California, and to go back to his roots.

“Sehun,” was her voice again, before he pulled away. His head whipped to the side, but she was already slipping away from his peripheral vision. And he can’t turn back. It was a joke, he knew, what she said, but he wasn’t about to turn back, no matter how taken aback he was.  _Sehun_. “My name’s Sooyoung.”

 

***

 

Up until this day, he wouldn’t know how she was able to find out what his real first name is. Maybe there were obvious clues in his stuff? Or maybe he let it slip while he was busy opening up to her? Whatever the reason was, Sehun was okay with it. Sehun was okay with her knowing. It was just a name. She knew the person he is. She knew his innermost core, his soul. And he knew the soul she is without knowing what name she had.

 _Sooyoung_  and not  _Xiuying_. The first lie she told and the last truth she gave.

 _Sooyoung_. Flower petal. Peaches and cream complexion and a bright smile and dark hair flying in the wind.

**Author's Note:**

> firstly, i don't claim to know the whole us of a landscape well so i know i made some mistakes with the descriptions + i know it's impossible to traverse the whole country from east to west coast in just one week in the pace they were doing it -- suspension of disbelief pls :(
> 
> this was also cross-posted from my aff account baekbaby19. this fanfic is also dedicated to megan, @airbendersehun on twitter :)


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